The study, which took place between 22 September and 6 November this year, found that happiness joined perceptions of Muslim population size and homophobia in being wildly overestimated.

Bobby Duffy, managing director of the Ipsos MORI Social Research Institute in London, said: "We are often most incorrect on factors that are widely discussed in the media, such as the proportion of our population that are Muslims, and wealth inequality.

"But in this new study we also show that we’re often unduly pessimistic about how happy people are.

"In many countries, particularly in the West, we have a picture of our population that is unduly miserable and intolerant.”

Other countries were also overly pessimistic, with South Korea guessing that three in four people were unhappy. In reality, 90 per cent of those surveyed considered themselves to be generally pleased.

Happiness isn’t the only detail British people are misjudging. The amount of home-owning households is 17 percentage points higher than expected by the public, who think less than half of families are property owners.

Brits also think a fifth of GDP spending goes to fund the NHS, while the actual figure shows that it's half the amount - at a spend of ten per cent.

Overestimating spending on healthcare is a common theme across the 40 countries surveyed, with Indonesians thinking their government spends 13 times more on healthcare than it actually does.

Conducted before the US election, Ipsos Mori research also identifies Russia, China and Serbia as the only countries to predict victory for Donald Trump.

Half of Russia predicted a Trump White House, while only 29 per cent were willing to take a chance on Hillary Clinton.